PAGE 1 // AUGUST 2023 - Contesting the Foundations of Digital Public Infrastructure

The Digital Public Goods Alliance defines DPI as “solutions and systems that enable the effective provision of essential society-wide functions and services in the public and private sectors”; while the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation describes it as a “digital network that enables countries to safely and efficiently deliver economic opportunities and social services to all residents.” Recently, t. [...] The introduction of DPI initiatives—including the introduction of the use of digitized biometrics, data exchange, and the linkage of many public and private services to the digital ID ‘layer’–has exacerbated these problems. [...] A landmark decision of the High Court of Kenya in 2021 found multiple deficiencies in the legal procedures surrounding the Huduma Namba system and in effect halted the project. [...] Additionally, the NRF along with Data Rights and the Kenya Human Rights Commission have filed a case in a French High Court arguing that IDEMIA, the company that had contracted with the Kenyan government to provide technology for the Huduma Namba system, did not undertake the necessary human rights due diligence, including a human rights risk assessment, before providing the technology. [...] It’s just not the same as any other data… [the Court] recognized the sensitivity that biometric data has and how you need to pass a strict scrutiny test in order to address that, in order to see that the measure is proportional to the final objective that you want to have.